


Theory of Flight

by irrelevant



Category: DCU, DCU - Comicverse
Genre: Alternate Universe, Gen, Not-Robins
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-07-17
Updated: 2010-07-17
Packaged: 2017-10-10 14:51:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,597
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/100974
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/irrelevant/pseuds/irrelevant
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Comics Bat-verse AU, Tim and Jason-centric, non-explicit character death, not Jason or Tim.  For shiny_glor_chan, who wanted Jason as the first Robin.  Except he isn't.  Jason isn't Robin.  Dick would have been Robin, but he wasn't and now Jason will have to find his own name.  Tim doesn't need to find a name.  There are other things he needs.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Theory of Flight

i. with the greatest of ease

Dick Grayson falls and falls and falls until he stops. He doesn't get up.

Tim Drake's eyes are open. His mouth is closed. The rest of him is screaming.

Part of him never stops.

\--

"Jack, turn that thing down, I can hear it all the way in the—oh. That's… those circus people."

"They're saying Zucco had a grudge. Probably something to do with drugs—seems like these things are always tied to drugs. Dent's office finally got enough for an indictment."

"They seemed like—like nice people. I—"

Jack looks away from the screen. Looks up at his wife, the pinch of her full mouth and her arms, wrapped tight around herself. Worry line on her forehead, deep like it was that night after she came out of Tim's room.

He says, "Jan." Holds out his hand.

She's slow to respond. Slow to turn away from the television and see him and his hand, and then she's moving like a sleepwalker and her hand is cold in his.

He can't remember the last time they went to bed at the same time. Not sure if they woke up together this morning.

He starts to say, "It'll be okay," but she's looking at something over his head. Her fingers clamp down on his, crushing his skin and flesh; it's a good thing she's not from Krypton. He sees the shape of a word in her opening mouth, but the TV is too loud. He turns it off.

Behind him, Tim's high, tiny voice says, "Mom? That… was that…"

The pressure on his fingers eases. Janet drops his hand. Her hip bumps the arm of the chair as she goes, leaving Jack behind, and he hears, "Come on, sweetheart, you need to brush your teeth."

He waits until he can't hear her footsteps or Tim's before he turns the TV back on. Mutes it and stares at the screen, rubbing his tingling fingers. A documentary on endangered birds follows a sit-com, and then the clip of the acrobats again, flying on the late news. Yellow-green-red costumes, vivid, obscenely alive beneath the shadow holes where their faces should be.

Last of their kind. Extinction in full.

Jack turns the TV off and goes to sleep without brushing his teeth.

It doesn't matter. He's all that's living in his bed.

\--

"There is one more thing," the woman says. "I didn't want to mention it. Tim is such a quiet, well-behaved child—he's a blessing, really, but…" She holds the paper in her hands out.

Janet takes it, turns it, avoiding the sweat-wilted edge. Glances at it for verisimilitude's sake, even though she already knows what's on it. She's seen the same shapes drawn on different grades of paper, cloth restaurant napkins. Black, green, red crayon mural on a bedroom wall.

The new paint smell stung her throat and her eyes, hung around the halls for weeks, stalking her, waiting for Tim to come back.

Tim slept in the guest room next to the master suite. Drew bats on his arms and the backs of his hands in dark purple ink.

Janet started buying sketch pads.

He's gotten better since the purple ink days. The angles and shading are good, very good for an eight-year-old, but Tim does like to get things as right as he can.

She says, "He's always been creative. I find that worth encouraging."

"He's a wonderful artist," Tim's teacher says, "that's not the problem."

Janet lays the drawing flat in her lap. Tim is her son; half of his DNA is hers, and she likes to get things right, too. She's had thirty-six years to raise her eyebrow, twist her lips exactly the way she needs to, and she does it now, just right. "Suppose you tell me what the problem is, Ms. Platt."

Platt's mouth is uncertain. Her eyebrows dive in, hunted, and she says, "He doesn't interact much with the other children, doesn't participate in voluntary group activities. All he seems to do with his free time is draw—well—" her mouth twists, bad taste that tastes bad— "Batman. It's… unnerving, to be honest, and the rest of the class has noticed. I've had to assign him a new seat three times since September."

Janet holds up the drawing. Dark Knights and broken boys. They crumple inward under her fingers. "You'd find it more acceptable if he drew fairy tales instead of heroic urban myths? Children killing the witch who tried to eat them and so on?"

"Not _me_, I… there's been some… concern." Platt sounds miserable and Janet almost feels sorry for her. Not quite.

She picks up her bag as she stands, pulling it over her shoulder. Tim's drawing crackles in her hand. He doesn't—

He stopped. She remembers wanting to believe it was over last year when he stopped drawing… that. He's switched to birds, lately; the more colorful, the better.

The males usually have the brightest feathers. Tim picks red shirts when she gives him a choice.

"Thanks for making me aware of your concerns," she says as Platt rises to take her offered hand. "Tim is fine. If you need a disclaimer, I can have his last therapist write you a note."

"Mrs. Drake—"

"It was nice meeting you, Ms. Platt. I'll see you on parent-teacher night?" She shakes the woman's sticky hand and leaves without wiping her palm off on her pants leg.

Tim isn't at the car yet; she checks her watch. Recess won't be over for another ten minutes. She supposes she should be thankful for that.

She throws her bag and Tim's drawing onto the passenger's seat. Lets her head fall against the driver's seatback and closes her eyes.

Five years only seems like a long time when you're looking back at it. You don't feel time as much when you're busy living it. You don't notice your growing acceptance of your life as it is as opposed to the way it used to be, until it's too late to change anything at all.

Jack stopped asking her to travel with him a year ago. It's even longer since she last responded to the Institute's calls and emails. Two half-written papers on her hard drive will never leave it. New discoveries every year negate or rewrite everything that came before. It's always been publish or perish and she's been out of the game too long.

She opens her eyes. Tim is on the other side of the window. He blinks at her and she hits the locks.

She watches him slide into the backseat in the rearview mirror, watches as he sets his backpack carefully down on the seat beside him and does up his belt. When he lifts his head, his eyes meet hers in the mirror.

She looks away first into silence trapped like a fly inside sealed, untinted windows. She can't hear a damn thing over her own heartbeat, hard against the inside of her skull.

She starts the car, avoiding Tim's eyes in the mirror as she backs out, and tries to remember where Jack is today. He's leaving again soon—day after tomorrow? She thinks she remembers him telling her that. Somewhere in South America, Chile possibly, or Peru. The company has offices all over the southern continent.

She's always wanted to see Machu Picchu. Incan culture isn't her specialization, but she's never met an ancient civilization she didn't like.

Maybe Jack will make the climb with her.

A car horn honks, making her jump, and a woman with multiple facial piercings and no hair waves impatiently at her from the front seat of a VW bug. She takes the driver's invitation and pulls out into traffic.

Tim is quiet all the way home. When she chances a look in the mirror, he's looking out the window instead of at the rear view, and when she pulls into the garage he waits for her to press the automatic locks instead of opening his door himself. As he gets out of the car, she holds up the drawing. "There are classes for this," she says. "Would you like to take one?"

His head jerks up. "I can?"

She wonders if he'd let her hug him, or if he thinks eight is too old for mom hugs. She gets out of the car and holds out a hand and he edges around the open car door and leans against her without hesitation. Gently, she brushes his thick hair away from his forehead. She swallows her sudden desire to cry for no reason at all. "You can do anything you want to. If you practice enough, if you want it enough…"

He's very still against her. She lets him be, lets him lean, her fingers trapped by his hair. She feels him nod.

"Can we go inside now?" he asks, his voice muffled by her hip. She still wants to cry. She still doesn't know why.

"Go ahead," she says, giving him a little push towards the house. "I'll be there in a second."

She leans back into the car to retrieve her bag, and she doesn't see him disappear around the corner of the garage, but she hears him go.

It's safe then to let her face twist up. Let everything twist and come up until she has to swallow it down again before it spills out of her like the rain the weather forecasts have been promising all week that hasn't come yet.

In the rear view mirror's slanted surface, her mascara is intact. Tim's drawing folded into eighths fits neatly inside one of her bag's zippered inner pockets. She locks the car and closes the garage, and reminds herself to ask Tommy to get her luggage down from the attic.

Two days later, following Jack up precarious steps into the cabin of a company jet, she reminds herself to take half an hour sometime soon. Take it, empty it of everything but herself so she can figure out what the hell she's doing.

The plane is too full for that. Full of… someone else's possessions.

She sits beside a window like any commercial airline window anywhere, on a chair that feels more like a sofa than an airline seat and pulls out her Gooseberry. She could call, Tim would—she checks the time. Tim is in school.

Jack sits down next to her, leaning in to kiss her temple. "All right?"

"Fine." She thinks she's smiling; her mouth feels like it's the right shape. Flight engines throb: she can feel the heat of them, the vibration through the deck.

She puts the Gooseberry back in her bag and looks out the window at the tarmac beginning to slip past. The asphalt is wet in patches with rain promised and finally delivered.

Janet holds her bag on her lap, crushing the lip with her fingers until she feels the crumple of paper inside the inner cloth pocket.

She keeps swallowing.

\--

Always, the boy's door is closed.

Always, Ida hates herself for hesitating before knocking.

Tim is a good boy, never a moment's bother. He even picks up after himself, no leftover dishes on his desk, no stray socks living under his bed.

He's quiet and careful and thoughtful, Tim is, the kind of boy most parents think they want. His eyes give Ida McIlvenne the creeping crawls.

There's just something not right about a child who does what they ought before they're asked to. Ask and he'll do what he's asked with the care and concentration of someone three times his age, which seems even more wrong and makes her wonder if he's saving up all his good behavior against something bad enough that she can't imagine it.

She's told herself over and over that she's a silly old fool—what on earth does she expect the child to be getting up to, for goodness' sake? Aside from his art and judo classes, he's more interested in books and computers than social activities. Unless he's aiming to be like that Luthor fellow in Metropolis, he doesn't give himself much room for getting into trouble.

He's a good boy. A boy to be proud of.

And she is here. Damp palms and dry mouth, standing outside a closed door with him on the other side of it.

It's different downstairs in the common rooms. In the kitchen and the dining room and the great room with the enormous television built into the wall. Downstairs means open doors and drapes. Empty spaces mixed in with Mr. Drake's antiques, Mrs. Drake's fusty old pots and broken statues.

Up here, books and pots collect dust on shelves in closed up bedrooms. Ida can't walk past a doorway and see Tim on the phone talking to a friend, doing his homework, playing one of those infernal computer games her own grandkids love so much—all the annoying, normal things kids do. She always has to knock and he always has to say, so polite, "Come in, Mrs. Mac."

She tells herself she's the only person in the house other than him. That's how he knows it's her. She wipes her damp hand against the rough weave of her skirt before she wraps her fingers around the knob and turns it.

Tim is sitting in front of his computer, typing. His school books are piled neatly on his desk and his drapes are pulled back, letting in the late day sun.

"There's a package for you downstairs," she tells him. "It's large, so I had them put it in the library."

"All right," he says. "Thank you for telling me."

She's been in service for most of her life. She knows what dismissal sounds like. She closes the door behind her because she's been in service for most of her life and those in service do not make decisions for those they serve.

She's done her duty. Tim knows about the package and his door is closed again. It's almost five. Ida goes to make dinner.

An hour and a half later, she takes her chicken out of the oven and goes looking for Tim.

He's in the library with the doors open and the box lying empty and discarded on the floor beside Mrs. Drake's desk.

It's actually a crate more than a box: all wood and full of packing materials designed to keep the contents safe on a journey from a corner of the world far from Gotham. The contents are several smaller boxes. They're now sitting on the desk, and Tim is standing over them, frowning at the sheet of paper in his hands.

The air conditioner shuts off with a quiet huff, muffling the house in cool stillness. Ida hovers in the doorway, unwilling to break the quiet, but Tim raises his head and sees her. He holds up the paper. "They're staying another week."

"Well," she says. And, "Well," again, because she can't think of anything else to say. It's not her place to offer… anything.

Tim blinks at her and his eyes go a little unfocused. He tilts his head to one side. "Chicken?"

She'd almost forgotten why she came in here. "It's ready now if you're ready to eat."

"I'll be there in a few minutes, if that's all right." He waits for her nod before he folds the letter up and sets it down on the desk between two cardboard boxes, one open, one not. He picks up the unopened one, and he must feel her stare because he glances at the open box and says, "It's Etruscan. From Dad."

She says, "Well," again. She hasn't the faintest clue what Etruscan means, other than very old and odd-looking and possibly missing a stone limb or two.

It does occur to her, not for the first time, how strange it is that Mr. Drake always sends ancient trinkets. Mrs. Drake is the archaeologist. Mrs. Drake sends…

Things like the expensive looking camera Tim just lifted from the second box.

Ida blinks, caught in an unwelcome and uncharacteristic moment of insight. Mr. Drake sends things he likes or thinks he ought to send. Mrs. Drake sends things she knows Tim will want.

Blissful ignorance or deliberate manipulation. There isn't—it's not even a matter of the best of the worst. Which is more than Ida wants to know about her _own_ motivations, much less her employers'.

Tim probably knows all of this. He's too knowing for a child—for anyone—and he knows too many of the wrong kinds of things. She can't tell if he _cares_, but the downstairs shelves are full of pretty, foreign curiosities, and Tim—

He's holding the camera in the cradle of his hands. He's already doing things to it, taking bits off, adding other bits from the box.

The light coming in the open windows bares his face. His hands are sure and careful on the camera. Ida sees everything; the empty camera box; the box full of Etruscan whatever-you-like; sun-kissed skin and metal and stone. She sees Tim's smile.

She leaves the room before she can allow herself to understand how grateful she is that he's not smiling at her.

\--

Moving in the middle of the school year always sucks. Going from a K through six to middle school sucks worse.

And it's not like he was ever at the top of the elementary food chain, but at a regular elementary school, a sixth-grade glasses-wearing, Galaxy Wars-loving geek is still a sixth grader. Being year six means you count for something.

Ives can't begin to subtract all the nothing he is out of Swan Middle School's equation. The number is so far into negative territory it's more like imaginary, like _he's_ imaginary: too new to be real, fitting in nowhere and unseen by everyone except for the people he doesn't want to notice him, the ones who have a sixth sense for anomalies—for finding them and making them wish they'd never been born.

People like Karl Ranck and his douchebag friends, and there's nothing new or unseen about them.

Their classification is everywhere, on every blacktop or basketball court, at the malls and the skate parks and down in the tubes. The only difference is, at Swan they're a lot taller and bigger than they were at his old school, and they think being grade eight means they get to make life hell for everyone who isn't. As far as Ives can see, they're right.

Right about everything, and if you don't agree, you keep your opinions to yourself. Bucking the hierarchy gets you face down on the gym locker room floor, hands tied behind your back with day-old sweat socks and somebody's dirty jock strap in your mouth.

Or cornered in the shower, your towel stolen and dangled just out of your reach until you lunge for it and stumble and Ranck snaps your ass with your own towel as you go down, fall flat on your face while everyone in the locker room laughs.

That was last Friday. Monday isn't going to be much different.

Except for all the ways it _is_ going to be different, if only because some other kid is going to get smeared instead of Ives.

Tiny kid, couple of inches shorter than Ives, but he's standing between Ives and Ranck like Ives is someone to be protected, eyeballing Ranck like he's day old roadkill. Ives wishes he had the guts to push the kid out of the way and take Ranck's shit, but the kid is _there_ and Ives wouldn't know how to move him even if he wanted to.

It doesn't make any sense. There's no reason for the kid to stand up for Ives in the first place. He doesn't know Ives from the next guy, and Ives has seen him twice, from a distance.

He's not new like Ives—he was there on Ives's first day, two weeks ago, but Ives hasn't seen him since, which means he probably wasn't around for last week's Ives Humiliation Extravaganza. Which means he's sticking up for some loser he's never met and wouldn't have noticed if they didn't have lockers on the same row and Ranck was less of a dickhead.

Whether that makes him awesome or batshit is up for discussion, or it would be if they were anywhere else. But they're not and the kid's hands are in fists and Ranck's boys are spreading out, so Ives says, "Um, hey? It's not like I don't appreciate this, but—"

"Leave him alone," the kid tells Ranck, and Ives's heart drops, it freaking _plummets_, bottoms out in his stomach acid, and ew. He squeezes his eyes shut because he doesn't want to see the punch coming, and wow, how screwed _are_ they?

At least… he thinks they are?

Because. No blood in his mouth. Still got all his teeth.

Lockers rattle, slam shut. Kids are coming and going around them, talking, running, making a lot of noise, but he's inside a sphere of noninterference with the kid and Ranck; until they're done with each other, nobody else gets in, and Ives doesn't get hit.

Cautiously, he opens one eye in time to see Ranck loom into the kid's space. "I told you to keep your nose out of my business, Drake."

"I told you to take your business where I can't find out about it."

Ives feels his mouth drop open. The kid—Drake—is dead. He just doesn't know it yet.

Ranck's face twists as he gets up in Drake's face. "What're you gonna do this time, freak? Tell your daddy on me?" Actually, he sounds kind of worried about that possibility. Also, _this_ time?

"No," Drake says, tilting his head to meet Ranck's eyes. "I'm going to do this."

And then he's moving almost too fast for Ives to see and Ranck is on the floor, groaning. Ranck's goon squad hesitates, staring. Dude with a shaved head and a wannabe goatee says, "Mother_fucker_," and goes for Drake.

Ives backs up, slamming into his locker and smacking his head. Dizzily, he watches Drake take two of Ranck's boys out with his backpack, and then the coach is yelling, "What's going on down there?" and real time gets potentially less painful really fast.

Everyone scatters but Ives and Drake and Ranck, who's up again, leaning against the dented lockers on his side.

Footsteps, one guy, slapping the concrete floor. Coach Lin stops at the end of the row and glares at the three of them. "Ranck? Drake? Is there a problem, here?"

"No problem, coach," Ranck says quickly. He slides a look sideways at Drake. "Ives knocked himself out on his locker, but he's okay. Right, man?"

"Yeah," Ives says. "I'm good." He rubs the back of his head—gonna have a bump—and tries out a grin on the coach. "And clumsy, I guess."

Lin eyes the three of them narrowly. He's obviously not buying what they're selling, but there's no one else left on the row to say any different. He gives Drake another long look and says, "Fine. You two, get dressed and get to class. Ives, do you need a pass to the nurse?"

"I think I'm okay," Ives says, and the coach turns his attention to Ranck.

"You're with me," Lin says, and Ranck shoves his hands into his pockets and trails after him. He smirks over his shoulder at Ives as he disappears around the corner, and Ives hears him say, "Coach? Do you think I could get a note? My stomach's feeling weird—"

Ives drops his head back and breathes in relief. All things considered, that could have gone… so much worse.

He hears the rattle of Drake's locker closing; Drake finishes tucking in his shirt and sits down to put on his shoes, and Ives joins him. He knots his laces, and he's about to thank Drake for saving his butt when Drake says suddenly, "Why didn't you tell him?"

"I—what?"

"You know," Drake says. He's staring a hole right between Ives's eyes. Ives stares back.

He knows, sure he does. And Drake should know the answer to his own damn question.

Ives stuffs his dirty gym clothes from last week into his backpack. He didn't get a chance to get them out. He was too busy getting himself out of the locker room.

"If I bitch to Lin," he says, "who's gonna watch my back? Not just here," he jerks a thumb at the exit, "out there, too. You? I don't think so."

"It's wrong," Drake says quietly.

Ives glances at him. The backpack Drake hurt two guys almost twice his size with dangles from his hand.

"I'm not up on your kung fu, Richard Dragon stuff. I mean, I can bleed on them, but that's about as scary as I get."

They both look down at Drake's hand wrapped around his backpack strap. His knuckles are pretty banged up, and Ives doesn't think all the damage happened just today.

"This is how it starts," says Drake. "For some criminals."

Ives rolls his eyes. "Look, can we not—"

"If their behavior doesn't change soon," Drake raises his voice, talking over Ives, "the violence of their actions will escalate. Eventually—" Ives can literally see the color draining from the kid's face— "Eventually, they'll hurt someone badly. Maybe kill them."

It's too… he doesn't… this is so…

"It's _wrong_," Drake says again. His hands are bunched into fists; his knuckles are turning white. The strap of the backpack he's still holding makes a stressed, creaking noise. Ives is close enough that he can see the shudder that goes through the kid right before he drops the backpack like it hurts to keep holding it.

Fucked up. That's the phrase he's looking for. This is fucked up and he really does not know what to say to this kid. He feels like he doesn't know enough to handle everything that's going on underneath Drake's surface, but if he makes it out in one piece, he's going to learn. He feels like it's on him to try.

He coughs once and his voice fails. Swallows, starts over and he manages to say, "Look, Drake… chill. It's okay. They're assholes, but that's all they are, you know? They're just looking for someone to push around, and I'm the new guy. They'll get bored after a week or two, trust me."

He's starting to wonder if Ranck was the safer bet, 'cause Drake looks like he's a few experience points short of the necessary skill set. And it's probably a bad idea, but Ives figures he owes Drake one. Maybe more than one. He puts a hand on Drake's bony shoulder and he says, "Hey," again.

Drake stops staring at his fists and blinks at him instead of crippling him. Ives takes the win.

"My name's Loren," he mimes gagging. "That's why everyone calls me Ives. Even my mom. I'm new around here. Want to hang?"

Another blink. "Tim. Drake. I—" He breaks off and his eyes unfocus; he's looking through Ives, not at him, like he's trying to decide if he wants to say yes or not.

It's kind of freaky, the eyes and the intensity level focused on a stupid question, but Ives is a gamer. He's used to this kind of thing. He dumps caution in the escape pod and hits eject. Hooks an arm around Drake's shoulders and gives him his best you-and-me-pal grin.

He gets a startled look instead of a gut punch, so he figures he's okay to say, "So, Drake. You're into that warrior stuff, right? How do you feel about questing?"

Drake blinks again. "Questing, as in… knights?"

"As in Matrix Flux! As in Paladin's Endgame! Dude!" He smacks himself on the forehead with his free hand because smacking the back of Drake's head equals bad idea. "Are you, like, a vampire? Only come out at night to feed, or something? Because you are so out of it."

"Or something," Drake says, his voice low and a little shaky. He slides out from under Ives's arm and picks up his backpack. "You're talking about computer games."

"Well, duh."

The bell picks that moment to ring. They both look up at the clock on the wall. "I have to go," Drake says and starts walking away.

Ives grabs his stuff and runs after him. "Wait up—hey!" He catches the doors before they slam in his face and ducks through, looking for Drake, and damn the guy moves fast. He's already halfway across the courts, heading for the west parking lot.

Ives jogs after, catching up to him at the gate in the football common's chain link fence. "Yo, space case, we've still got two periods left."

"You do," Drake corrects.

Ives groans. "Two free periods?"

Drake gives him an unreadable look. "I have a class at Winick Community. I'm already late." He's unlatching the gate as he says it, slipping through and closing it after him.

Ives hooks his fingers through gaping links. Fits his nose and mouth into a couple more holes and calls after Drake, "So I'll have my people call your people?"

Without turning, Drake raises a hand in a gesture that could be taken as a wave.

Ives decides to take it. He watches Drake get into the back seat of a silver BMW, watches the silver-haired lady in the driver's seat start the car. She pulls out of the lot and the sound of the engine dies away, replaced by the sounds of sixth period gym. If Ives doesn't move it, _he's_ going to be late.

He's halfway to class when he realizes he doesn't even have Drake's email, much less his cell number.

He says, "Fuck." Ducks a hall monitor and hikes his slipping backpack back up on his shoulder, and there goes the second bell, and… and fuck.

Middle school? Officially sucks _ass_.

\--

Jason drops down on the rooftop as silently as Bruce would have, but he's too late and there's no point. There's nobody there. Just him and the moon and a couple of gargoyles covered in pigeon shit, Gotham's jagged edges hemming them in.

He wasn't really expecting anything else. The kid is too small and too fast to get caught easily. He's also the luckiest bastard alive this side of Bruce, although Jason is starting to wonder if he is a 'he' at all. A girl—small, light, fast-moving—would make more sense for the age he's guessing.

Some of the best pickpockets he knows are girls. He stopped Bruce from busting one two days ago.

Bruce.

Jason crosses the roof as silently as he landed, tucks himself into the lee of the water tank and lights a cigarette. He holds it cupped so the glow won't fuck with his night vision, and looks up at the Bat signal, bright yellow light swallowing the platinum moon whole.

Bruce'll be there already, on top of Central doing his inclusive Bat knows all, sees all act for the commish. Old fogies only, sidekicks need not apply.

Jason gets it fine, he hears what the signal's saying loud and bright and clear. It's Bruce who's clueless.

Bruce thinks taking down a thirteen year old girl fighting for her survival is the right thing. He thinks throwing her back into the system, showing her how worthless everything she went through to survive is, is the answer. Same system that won't give custody to a young, single uncle with a steady job and a clean, one-bedroom apartment because his skin isn't light enough.

The courts handed _him_ over to Bruce like he was nothing. Like Bruce was _everything_, all he had to do was put out one clean, manicured hand and boom. One son coming right up, Mr. Wayne. Kid's even got the black-haired, blue-eyed thing going on—few years and they'll forget he's not really yours if you don't remind them.

Yeah, no, fuck _that_. Fuck the system and fuck Bruce.

So maybe he's still pissed about Jacinta. Pissed enough to let Bruce have it at full volume, tell him off good and loud. Tell him where he can stick his whitebread money so it'll do some good instead of perpetuating the status quo.

Pissed enough _not_ to tell Bruce about their mini-me stalker, whatever the kid's gender. Or maybe he just likes being one up on the big bad my-way-or-you're-fired Bat.

Maybe he wants to catch stalker kid himself, shove _that_ in Bruce's face.

Hey B-man, look what the Jaybird dragged in. How about that pat on the back, huh?

Jason knocks his head against the metal prop behind him until he stops wanting to laugh. He left his expectations in the ER beside his mom's body. God damn Bruce for waking that part of him up again, making him think things could maybe change when his fucking _cellular structure_ knows they never will.

Overhead, the Bat signal blinks out like a spooked firefly. Jason's cigarette is dying unsmoked, burned down to the butt. He crushes it between gauntleted fingers and flicks it away.

Smoking _and_ littering, oh my. Whatever would Alfred say?

The rusty sound of his own laughter startles him, but if you don't use something you lose it, and hanging with Bruce isn't about getting your chucks. He's not sure what it is about, not anymore. Maybe he needs to get out of Bruce's mausoleum as himself more often, get out around normal people, whatever the hell any of that means.

He's pretty sure chasing stalker kids across Southside rooftops isn't in it.

Grapple out, he walks to the edge of the roof and considers his options. The neighborhood is full of chancy, derelict buildings, but there's a stone church with a bunch of sturdy looking gargoyles off to the left. Perfect.

"You're off my hook," he tells the listening darkness, "for now."

No answer, but he didn't expect one. He shoots his grapple, watches it curl around a gargoyle's neck and catch. Just before he jumps, he catches… something else. Movement in his peripheral vision, darkness sliding into more darkness.

He changes his trajectory midair, landing inside the cupola instead of on the outside ledge. Rising out of his crouch, he looks back at the roof he just left. There's nothing but dirty brick and concrete and the water tower, half empty and rusting out.

Figures.

 

ii. the aviary

He is nine and he is in his dad's office, waiting for his mom to come home and put him somewhere else. He's sitting on the ratty old couch his mom wanted his dad throw away. Instead of throwing it away, his dad bought his mom a new couch and moved the old one in here, and now Tim can sit on it and draw while his dad shouts at people over the phone.

He doesn't like the shouting, but he comes in here anyway because his dad has a map of Gotham that takes up a whole wall. It has everything on it, and someday Tim is going to know all of it.

For now, he's going to draw it. In pieces because his sketch pad isn't big enough to do it whole. Slowly because slow is the only way to make sure you get things right the first time.

Even though he's careful, sometimes he doesn't get it right. Sometimes he has to start over, and then he goes even slower the second time.

The map symbol for parks is a red bird. Tim draws one. Slowly.

Eventually, he gets it right.

Eventually, his dad stops shouting into the phone and notices him. He asks Tim why he's in here. Tim shrugs.

His dad comes out from behind the desk and looks at Tim's sketch pad. He asks if Tim likes the map. Tim says yes, even though he's not sure if he does. It's just something he needs to learn.

His dad asks if Tim would like the map for his room.

Tim looks at the red bird perched on Robinson Park. If the map is in his room, he can add symbols to the key. He can draw symbols for the bad things that happen sometimes on certain streets.

They won't be bats. His mom looks unhappy and disappointed when he draws bats, so he doesn't draw them at home anymore.

The red bird is there and bright and very, very red. If he draws more of them, his mom probably won't notice. She's not around to notice as much as she used to be.

"Yes," he tells his dad. "I would." He says, "Thank you," even though he knows his dad is offering the map to get him out of the office.

Mrs. Mac and Tommy, who helps out sometimes, are almost finished hanging the map in his room when his mom comes home and tells him she's going away with his dad for a while. She says a month. She says she'll send him post cards and call him and be home before school starts.

Tim says okay because it doesn't matter what he says. She'll go if she wants to and she'll come back when she remembers to.

It's thirty-one red birds and fifty-six days before she remembers. Two months, and then she comes home, and he wants to ask her to stay but she's blurry around her edges and he can't see her well enough to know if it's okay to ask.

Five red birds later, she leaves again.

She leaves and comes home and leaves again after only two red birds, and after that she never stays.

And Tim is ten.

His mom has sent him a new camera to replace the one he broke last month.

"I don't know how you do it," she laughs into the phone. "How long did the Nikon last? Two months? Those photography classes are looking like a bad investment."

"You could have sent more sketch pads and pencils." Tim looks away from his new camera to the frozen video footage on his computer screen. December is a month for giving and getting new things. Batman has a new partner.

He wonders who had to give so that Batman could get a boy wrapped in black and blue, blue for his eyes, black around them, black hair above his black cape, blue everywhere else his skin used to be.

"It's almost Christmas," Tim says, and he hears the sharp sound Mom doesn't mean to make, doesn't intend to give him.

He listens to her breathe.

She says, "Tim." Still breathing.

Mrs. Mac has a magnetic board on the wall in the kitchen. She sticks grocery lists and reminders to it with magnets that say things like _thou shalt honor thy mother and thy father_ and _thou shalt not lie._

Sometimes Tim thinks you can't do one without also doing the other. Sometimes you have to lie first so they don't have to. "I have judo tonight."

She sounds grateful if not honored. "All right. I'll let you go then. I love you."

"I know," he says, because it's the only true thing he has.

"I'll see you soon."

He doesn't. Not until he's almost eleven.

He doesn't bother wondering if they've come for his birthday. Mom has meetings at the Institute; she's arguing her findings against a colleague's findings—that's what her last post card said. And Dad doesn't like to be away from her for long.

It confuses Tim that his dad never stays in Gotham if his mom is gone. They fight more than he thinks people who love each other are supposed to; sometimes they yell, and he waits in his room until he hears his mother's BMW or his father's Porsche leave.

One of them always leaves after a fight, but they never stay gone long. Tim stays in his room after the BMW or the Porsche comes back, too. It's just… better. For everyone.

He's glad there's no fighting this time. His mom is locked in the library. There's a 'disturb and die' sign taped to the double doors, and when his dad is home he wanders past them every hour or so and raps, and gets growled at. Tim knows this because he's gone past his dad going past the library on his way back from getting a drink from the kitchen.

This time Tim is holding a glass of strawberry juice. Maybe the bright pink of it is why his dad notices him. "Hey Timbo," Dad says, and smiles, and Tim feels himself smile back. "Busy?" his dad asks.

"No," Tim lies, deliberately not thinking about his overdeveloped negatives, helpless in the face of his dad smiling at him, his dad's hand ruffling his hair, settling warm on his shoulder. He can feel the strength of his dad's fingers through his shirt.

"You know, Wayne's doing his usual blowout tonight," Dad says. He glances at the closed library doors then turns his smile back on Tim. "Looks like your mom's going to be in there for a while yet. How about we get out of her hair for a few hours and see if Bruce does fireworks as big and splashy as he does everything else?"

You mean you're bored and tired of being growled at, Tim thinks, but he says, "Okay." His dad laughs and ruffles his hair again.

"Go get changed. I'll meet you at the garage in five."

Tim looks down at his jeans and t-shirt. "What should I—"

"Pretend we're hitting the links," his dad says, the laugh still in his voice. "If I know Bruce, that's all we'll hear about, all night."

Tim doesn't know Bruce Wayne, at least no better than anyone else who follows the news. He's never met him, but he's read about him on the web and in magazines and newspapers. He's listened to his dad's boardroom and golf course war stories the few times he's been given the opportunity.

Bruce Wayne is Gotham, like Central or the Grand and the Courthouse. He donates, he funds, he generates. He's on television, dedicating buildings, attending ceremonies, giving money away like sunlight, like water.

And no, Tim hasn't _met_ him, but he remembers him a little from—from then. He remembers him kneeling down in the ring. There was… something. On his knees. When he stood up.

"Tim?" A note of impatience creeping in, pushing the laughter out.

The familiarity of it is almost a relief. "Five minutes, got it."

He takes the stairs two at a time. Washes his face and pulls on khaki slacks and a red polo, then back down the stairs and the Porsche is idling out front, waiting. It hasn't quite been five minutes.

"Buckle up," says Dad, the last thing either of them says until they're pulling into the circular drive in front of Wayne Manor.

Dad tosses his keys to the waiting valet. Tim stands at the bottom of stone steps and looks up for what seems like forever. "Only thing missing is the moat," his dad laughs, coming to stand beside Tim.

"The terrain was judged too unstable," says a dry, accented voice. "The strata here are partially limestone, a notoriously unstable rock formation. The original blueprints did indeed make allowances for the possibility of a moat-like structure, but fortunately for the necks of countless Wayne heirs, the hazard was excluded from the final drawings."

"Alfred," Tim's dad says to an older man in a dark suit that looks too hot for July. "Never change."

"I shall endeavor to comply, sir," Alfred replies. "If you and the young sir are looking for Master Bruce, he may be found in the topiary garden, though for how long that will hold true, I can't say."

Music, jazz is playing somewhere nearby, blending with the sound of approaching cars and the distant buzz of voices. Dad is laughing again, laughing with his arm around Tim's shoulders, pulling Tim close, and Tim doesn't—he can't—

He doesn't want to be small and stiff and silent, not with his dad holding him in the careless, perfect way he's seen other fathers hug their children. All he can do is hold still and hope his dad doesn't notice.

Jack Drake doesn't seem to notice anything but Alfred. He doesn't let go of Tim. He says, "I'll talk to Bruce later. I doubt whoever he's, ah, _showing_ around the topiary would be happy with me for interrupting. We're mainly here for the show." His arm tightens around Tim. "Right, kiddo?"

"Yes," Tim tells his dad's smiling eyes. He watches their edges crinkle and fold like old paper.

"Very good, sir," says Alfred. "The fireworks are scheduled for a half hour after sundown, so you should not have long to wait. However, if you are feeling impatient, both Ms. Kyle and Ms. Vale are on the grounds. Should they encounter one another, I would not rule out the possibility of explosions."

Dad is shaking his head. "Same old Bruce. He never changes, does he, Alfred?"

"Not to my knowledge," says Alfred, but his voice has lost its dry edge. His spine looks as stiff as Tim feels. "I believe you know the way, sir?" he says.

There are more cars coming up the drive, more voices, more guests.

"Sure, Alfred. Thanks," Dad says as he steers Tim away down a walk that takes them around the bulk of the house, through a garden that's mostly roses, and drops them on a wide lawn full of people and temporary pavilions.

There's a bandstand complete with band set up under one gauzy white construct, the source of the music. The fading light of dusk makes the sweat beading the saxophonist's forehead glisten. He's wearing a full tux.

"Only Bruce," Dad says as his arm drops away from Tim's shoulders. He starts to say something else, but someone calls, "Jack? Jack Drake, is that you? I haven't seen you on the courts in forever," and he turns around to take the hands of a very pretty woman.

Tim watches the woman smile at Dad, sees her hands tighten on his, pulling him closer. He hears the way his Dad's voice changes, deepens when he says, "Dana. I still owe you a rematch, don't I?"

Tim stays where he is. He doesn't know what else he's supposed to do. Not with his dad sounding like someone else, someone Tim doesn't belong to.

He knows there are people around him, moving, speaking to each other, being alive, but he can't see anyone but his father. He can't hear anything but the woman's, Dana's, laughter.

And then a hand comes down on his shoulder, making him jerk. A new voice speaks in his ear, low and smooth and richer than the man it belongs to. "Hey there. You must be Jack's boy, Tom."

"Tim," Tim says, and looks up into Bruce Wayne's dark blue eyes.

Dad turns around, one of Dana's hands still in his, and says, "Trying to steal my kid, Wayne?"

The sun is nearly down. Portable lamps are blossoming to dim life, and in their light Wayne's teeth show up brilliantly white against his tan skin.

According to Vicki Vale's column, he spent the last two months on the Côte d'Azure with three different models. Two of them were women. The third… wasn't.

"Wouldn't dream of it," he says, holding the hand not on Tim's shoulder out. Tim is very aware of the shape and weight of his fingers and palm, bigger, heavier than his father's, but resting lightly. Wayne's thumb brushes Tim's collarbone as he says, "Heck, I already tried with Jan, and she told me to buzz off. And I've got a boy of my own, now, or hadn't you heard?"

"I think I did hear something to that effect, yes. Congratulations." Dad lets go of Dana and takes Wayne's hand. Their clasped hands are directly in Tim's line of sight, and he sees knuckles turning white, fingers straining under opposing pressures. On his shoulder, Bruce Wayne's other hand doesn't tighten. There's no pressure, nothing to weigh Tim down. It's just there.

Tim is sure it's a reminder, but whose and of what, he can't begin to guess. He just knows that if someone doesn't give in, someone else's bones will.

He wishes he could say something. That he knew what to say, how to stop this. He doesn't know what he needs to know, he doesn't know _enough_, and there's sweat at his dad's hairline, a bead of it trickling down his temple, and Wayne is still _smiling_.

Tim's dad coughs once. Wayne's thumb stills against Tim's neck, on his skin, and Tim pretends he's on a rooftop, he pretends he can feel his camera in his hand, and Wayne… relaxes his grip.

Tim remembers to breathe. He inhales and he can smell Wayne, clean sweat and leather, no cologne. He scuffs one foot and the sharp green scent of grass fresh cut today rises, blocking out other scents, almost but not—not—

Out of the corner of his eye, he can see Dana's face, tight and bloodless. He breathes and breathes and tries not to smell Wayne, and he tries not to think about his mother, at home behind her red marker on white paper barricade with her hair in a ponytail, mouthing her thoughts onto her computer screen.

Dad's hand drops. Wayne's hand slips down and away, his thumb an afterthought on Tim's nape.

Wayne's smile is relaxed and natural and completely wrong. He tucks his hands into his pants pockets and says, "I'm surprised to see you tonight, Jack. I hadn't heard you were back in town, but I just got back myself."

Something about his voice is… strange. Off. Tim wonders why Bruce Wayne would need to lie about something so trivial.

"Sorry to drop in on you without warning," Dad is saying. "I didn't find the invite until yesterday evening."

"Oh, I'm sure Bruce is happy to have you," Dana finally puts in. She steps forward into their loose circle and her smile is too wide, something desperate turning the corners of her mouth up tight. "Aren't you, Bruce?" she says, pointedly, and Wayne grins lazily down at her like an amused cat before reaching out and wrapping one big hand around hers, pulling her in and kissing her cheek.

"Of course I am, darling," he says. "In fact, I thought Tim might like to meet Jason. I think they're the only two kids here." He kisses Dana's hand and gives it back to her as he turns back to Tim. "How about it, tiger? You bored yet?"

Tim shivers. Once. He takes a careful step back and he watches Bruce Wayne watch him take it. "Where is he?" he asks. He's almost certain he's out of range of anyone's hands.

"Jay?" Wayne says, and Tim hears it wrong, an echo _Jay Jay Jay_ imposed over some other word. Before he can figure out what the word is, Wayne says, "He's over there." He points, and at the edge of the grass, Tim can make out someone sitting on the ground, propped against a tree. As he watches, Bruce Wayne's Jason pulls what looks like a cigarette from behind his ear and sticks it in his mouth.

Wayne's mouth tightens.

Tim's dad laughs, shortly. "You can take a rat out of an alley…" And Tim forgets how to breathe again.

So does Bruce Wayne. Tim can't see his chest moving at all.

The song changes from an upbeat pop riff to something old and slow and heavy on the bass. Dad says, "God. Bruce. I'm sorry. That was a shi—" He glances at Tim. "I shouldn't have said that. I'm sorry."

Time is the useless motion of his dad's hand, open and empty. It's the rise of Bruce Wayne's chest. The fall of Tim's.

"I'd like to meet your son, Mr. Wayne," Tim hears himself say. He feels his feet move forward, giving up his hard won ground.

Dana leans closer to Tim's dad, close enough for their shoulders to touch.

Bruce Wayne looks down at Tim. His hands are back in his pockets, and his smile is different. Not... better. Not really. Different.

"You're a lucky man, Jack Drake," he says. "Not everyone is. Coming, Timmy?"

And he's walking and Tim is stumbling after him, not looking back. "It's Tim," Tim says, ducking a woman in a tuxedo shirt and white pants carrying a tray of empty champagne flutes. "_Tim._"

"Heard you the first time, tiger," Wayne calls over his shoulder, and a second later someone else says, "Jesus, shut up. I told you how stupid you sound when you talk like that."

Wayne stops another tray-carrier— "Excuse me, thanks" –then hands Tim a glass of something that's probably ginger ale. He hands a second glass to Jason, who's standing in front of him, scowling.

The third glass—it has to be champagne. Bruce Wayne wouldn't drink anything else. "Jay, Timmy," he says, gesturing with his flute. "Timmy, Jay. I'm sure a couple of swell guys like you will have lots in common, ha ha!" His smile could sink a fleet of battleships. "You boys don't need a referee, so I'll just get out of your way."

The words are out of his mouth. His lips are closing and he's starting to back away. And two things happen.

The first thing is the fireworks. The first volley bursts in the sky in a sizzling silver-red crackle, startling Tim. His arm jerks and a few wet drops of ginger ale spray his hand.

Bruce Wayne tilts his head back like a child at a circus and says, "Would you look at that, boys."

And the second thing happens. Bruce Wayne's Jason leans forward and spills his soda all over Tim.

It's deliberate. Jason is watching Tim, smirking at him like—like the bigger boys on the playground used to, and he smells like stolen cigarettes and he looks like a _thug_. Whatcha gonna do about it, _Timmy_, his smirk says, and Tim wants, he wants to, to _hit_, he wants to feel teeth under his fist, see the split of Jason's lip and the blood, he wants to _see_, he almost _can_ see it, and then Bruce Wayne says, "_Jay_," and Tim sees… he doesn't see anything.

He hears.

He shouldn't have been able to hear that name in that voice, not over the fireworks, but it's a voice meant to be heard.

In dirty alleys and across rooftops, down in the pipes and even here, at Bruce Wayne's estate, that voice _has_ to be heard.

The last time Tim heard it say that name was last week. He was hanging from a tenth floor fire escape, watching Batman and Bluejay beat the Riddler's goons into pulp.

Tim hands are empty, his glass lying on the grass. He wants his camera, but he couldn't touch it even if he had it. He's sticky soda all over.

Jason, Jay, Bluejay is smirking, is a jerk, and Bruce Wayne is laughing with his mouth, cutting Tim apart with his eyes, Bruce Wayne is Batman.

Fireworks split the sky open, light raining red white blue noise exploding in Tim's ears.

Somewhere, in some other sky, Dick Grayson is always falling, never breaking. And Tim Drake is twelve years old.

Today, he is twelve. It's his birthday. There's a stamp-covered crate sitting on his bedroom floor that says so somewhere inside it. Happy Birthday Timmy, sorry we can't be there, love you, miss you, staying another week or two.

The crate came yesterday in a van with the Drake Industries logo on the side, delivered straight from a company jet. There were no other deliveries of any kind, but he didn't expect there to be.

He thinks the stamps on the crate are from Greece, but he's not certain. If he knew what was in the crate he'd probably know for certain, but he doesn't know what's in the crate because he hasn't opened it yet. He doesn't know when he will open it because he isn't in his bedroom.

He isn't in his house.

He's on a Southside apartment rooftop, sitting on the extreme edge of crumbling brick. If he looked down, he would see traffic moving slowly in the gap between his dangling feet. He doesn't look down because he is drawing.

He is drawing the gargoyle curled around one of the pillars supporting the cupola of the church across from the apartment building, so he doesn't look down. He looks across and draws and waits.

He doesn't have a camera with him tonight. He doesn't always carry one, because sometimes he'd rather draw, and this is his birthday. On your birthday, you're supposed to do things you enjoy doing.

Supposed to. Enjoy.

Enjoyment is a complicated concept. It's easier to accept the fact of it than to understand it.

Tim understands necessity. He understands the need for precision accuracy.

He doesn't think he enjoys waiting, but he's very good at it and it's often necessary. He waited to hear that Tony Zucco had died in a prison brawl. He waits for his parents to remember to come home in between countries. He waited for his body to grow big enough, strong enough to do all the things he needs it to do, and he waited for his mind to develop fully enough to connect the dots and find the pattern.

Even with the map and the birds, it took him too long to find the pattern, and for once the wait wasn't worth the payoff. Technically there was no payoff, because the pattern is that there isn't one.

He can never be sure of his timing, which bothers him. But if he can't be sure, neither can anyone else, which is conversely reassuring. The rest is… it's… unsettling. Not knowing is unsettling. Not being sure.

He will never understand people who enjoy gambling or auctions. The world only makes sense when chance is eliminated. For chance to be eliminated, you need a computer powerful enough to amass and correlate hundreds of thousands of gigs of statistics, factoring in such variables as population density, ethnic and cultural influence, economic status, sociopolitical demarcation. You need to be Batman.

Which is why the pattern that is no pattern is acceptable. Batman will have calculated all the long and short term outcomes. His reasons are logical and acceptable.

And there are… loopholes. Places and times more plausible than others.

Wait long enough in the right place within the right time frame, and eventually the air will whine and part, cut open by someone's jumpline. Cloth designed to do exactly what its wearer wants it to do will flare out then fall back into place, covering everything but the thick-soled boots impacting the roof with the minimum of sound.

Tim folds his sketchpad up and puts it and his pencil inside his backpack. Carefully, he swings his legs around and slides down from the ledge. Bluejay is standing in the shadow of the water tower, watching him.

At least, Tim thinks he is. The white-outs make it hard to tell.

He shrugs his shoulders and his cape falls back and away, exposing the aggressive jut of hips and crossed arms. He touches his mask and Tim watches his eyes come back bluer than his suit.

"You've been watching us," he says.

There are several reasons to lie, none of them good enough. "Yes," Tim answers.

Bluejay barks a laugh. "You've got a pair." He moves away from the tower, out of its shadow, and pulls a pack of cigarettes from his belt. He taps one loose, pulls it out with his mouth. Holds the pack out to Tim. "Want one?"

Tim shakes his head.

Bluejay shrugs, tucks the cigarettes away and lights up. "He doesn't know yet, not about you. I don't think so, anyway. I've been watching, too." He blows a thin stream of smoke that Tim is too far away to breathe in, but close enough to smell.

"Been watching _you_," says Bluejay. "You know, don't you? About us."

His expression isn't clear. Tim can see his jaw tightening; he can see the cigarette tearing open between gloved fingers. "I know," Tim says.

Bluejay nods, smoke-trailing smile, blue eyes squinted up behind black. "I figured. You were at that party on the Fourth last year. You were so pissed at me, and then it was like you woke up. I didn't figure out why until now." He laughs again, maybe at himself. "Pissed isn't the word for what the boss man is going to be."

It's Tim who nods now, because Batman is something beyond fury and Bluejay has to tell him about Tim. Maybe not tonight. Maybe not in a week or even a month. Soon enough, though, Batman will know, whether or not Bluejay tells him.

Tim's been lucky so far. Beginner's luck, measured in the torn knees of discarded jeans, in shredded shirts and smashed cameras, lost pens and pencils, in the constantly shifting array of bruises and scrapes on his palms and shins and elbows. He's down to his last pair of jeans and one too-large pair of cargo pants. His dad isn't good at remembering other people's measurements.

"Signal's up," Bluejay says. He drops his cigarette, crushes it out with the toe of his boot.

Tim turns his face to the sky. The Bat signal owns it. On any other day Tim would be moving already, heading for Central, but tonight it's not his move to make.

It's Bluejay's move, and he takes it, sliding between shadows toward the edge of the roof. He's pulling something from his belt—a grapple gun—and Tim slides after him, trying to get a closer look at the grapple and wishing for his camera.

A step away from the edge Bluejay stops. He looks back.

At Tim, he's looking at Tim. Like he's sizing him up for—

"Want a lift?" Bluejay says. "It's a little out of my way, but I can drop you close." He holds up the grapple and grins at Tim. He has the teeth of a rich man's son, and he's showing most of them.

And Tim is.

He has.

It's his birthday. Birthdays are for doing things you enjoy doing. Doing them with people you want to be around.

Tim closes his eyes and steps and steps and steps until Bluejay's breath warms his forehead. He waits for touch and it comes with a sharp laugh, skinless hands pulling him close against synthetic, fire-retardant, bullet-proof heat.

There is the sound of the grapple, catching. The weightless drop he was expecting but could never have imagined, never have anticipated, and there is speed and silence trapped somewhere within screaming sound, and the black behind his closed eyes.

And Tim is four and there are arms around him, strong and careful and wanted and fleeting, and he is eight and his mom is holding him against her with the lightest of touches, and he is twelve now, twelve years old and Jay, Bluejay, Jason Todd is touching him. Holding him, wrapped around him, whooping and laughing like a maniac while the sky whips them together and apart and the city sighs around them, and they. They are.

In, up, through the air, they are, and they're not coming down, ever.

Never fall.


End file.
